


And

by jdjunkie



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Episode Tag, Episode: s07e02 Homecoming, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-04
Updated: 2011-06-04
Packaged: 2017-10-20 03:00:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/208056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdjunkie/pseuds/jdjunkie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arrom made sense. Daniel Jackson made no sense.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And

Daniel shut the door to his room and leaned against it, grateful for the support.  He closed his eyes and reveled in the quiet and wondered if he had always found the SGC this noisy. He had a sudden yearning for the peace of Vis Uban.

His quarters had quickly become a refuge from the constantly assessing eyes of the good people of Stargate Command. Dr. Daniel Jackson, was lost and is found. Was dead and lives. No wonder he was the center of attention.

It was just all a little difficult to take. In particular, he found the kindness of his team hard to take because he was struggling to see it as kindness, more as pity underwritten by guilt and sorrow.

Sam’s sorrow at his perceived ordeal, Teal’c’s never-really-assuaged guilt, and Jack’s guilt _and_ sorrow, and a measure of pity from all of them, and Hammond and Fraiser too, and everyone else who knew him from before. He could identify the emotions well enough, he just couldn’t deal with them.

Daniel let out a deep breath and took off his BDU jacket, hooking it over the back of the chair at the desk. He switched on the lamp, irritated by the dull, yellowish glow. He hated the fact that there was no day or night down here. Hated the way every hour was the same, with no sense of time passing, that there was no sunshine, or starlight.  He ached for the easy, natural rhythm of the days on Vis Uban.

He remembered his time there with great affection and wished he felt the same about his life here. He had little tolerance for the gaps in his memory. Everything here was familiar and yet ... startlingly unfamiliar. Sam said he loved coffee and walnut cookies, but he didn’t know that. Didn’t _feel_ it. Her bright smile dimmed when she offered him a bag stuffed with freshly-baked goodies and he took it without the expected enthusiasm. He knew he’d lost a of what made him ... him, and no amount of careful smiles, or gentle pats on the shoulder or exhortations to “Give it time” made him feel any better about the situation he found himself in, or about the man who was Daniel Jackson.

Arrom, now, that was another matter.

He liked Arrom. He also liked the people who gave him the name and took him in, naked and confused as he was.  They offered him food, shelter and companionship and, in return, he made up stories for Shamda that he suspected told more about his own past than he understood.  He spoke of powerful beings and quests for truth; vast, sweeping sagas that held his audience captive and delighted, their attentive faces etched into his memory by moonlight and the flicker of campfires.

And, as he told these stories, of epic heroes, their fates decided by capricious gods, words echoed  ... rumors, lies, fairytales. Maybe they were, but they comforted him and gave him acceptance with the people who called him friend.

He was adopted with unquestioning kindness, and he’d repaid his new family’s generosity in the best ways he knew how.  He helped them gather crops and search for sites that would shelter them when winter came. Stories were precious to them, so he gave them willingly. He listened and learned when Shamda and the elders told him of their people’s history. Those times were the best. Times when they sat together at the end of the day and he soaked up details of their past. He always craved more.

In two months, he made a life there. There was a young woman, Aya, hair dark and long, with eyes that danced with mischief and fire. He saw her watching him sometimes, and felt a deep, undefined longing that had nothing to do with her but everything to do with the nameless woman who spoke to him in his dreams.  Aya wanted him and showed it in subtle and not so subtle ways, egged on by some of the older women and her giggling friends.  He was polite but firm in his refusal to take things further.

Arrom was content to be part of his new family, to learn and to do what he could to help. It was enough. A part of them, he was at the same time apart from them. He often went for long walks alone, during which he allowed his confused mind to wander where it would. He enjoyed his own company, and his friends allowed him that luxury, not questioning him when he returned, simply offering food and water and welcoming him back to the fold.

His life there made sense.

Arrom made sense.

Daniel Jackson made no sense.

Late in the day of Jonas’s return to Kelowna, he sat at the computer in the VIP room that housed the picture of Sha’uri and a small, stone statue of indeterminate origin among other things that Jack had “kept alive,” and read mission reports. He started with the earliest and worked his way through methodically, each story revealing a little more about the man everyone told him he was.

He read quickly, one sheaf of paper after another.  It was a lot to take in, but gradually he started to form an opinion of Daniel Jackson.

Daniel Jackson, he surmised, was something of an enigma. 

The reports only scratched the surface of who he was, judging by what Sam, Teal’c and Jack had told him. He didn’t see the brilliant mind or the compassionate soul that they saw.  He saw all too often for his liking an arrogant, foolhardy idiot, who charged blindly in where even the most reckless angel would fear to tread.

“I think I’m an ass,” he said, out loud, into the silence.

The reports detailed an unforgiving A-Z of events where there was no room for heart or intuition or feelings. He had to read between the lines to garner even a suggestion of those things. But still, he found it hard to believe what the others were telling him.

As far as he could see, Dr. Daniel Jackson had led his team into danger on more than one occasion. Yet, still, their relief and obvious delight at his return spoke of their ... love ... for him.

He didn’t understand it, and he couldn’t make the picture they painted of him fit with what he’d found in the words on the pages in front of him. Tired and bewildered, he slapped the folder closed on the desk and leaned back in the chair, running his hands through his hair. He checked his watch. It was almost 7.20 p.m.

Crap.

“Don’t be late,” Jack had said. “Teal’c gets a little cranky when his blood sugar gets low.”

He wanted to cry off the team dinner. He could plead a headache; no one should be surprised that a semi-amnesiac, recently-descended person might suffer from headaches. But that would be discourteous. Everyone was trying so damned hard to help him, and the only conclusion he could come to about that was that Daniel Jackson was worth it. He was worth helping.  Worth fighting for.

He glanced at the photograph of Sha’uri. She must have loved him. He’d certainly loved her -- those memories had flooded back in a rush of pain and joy -- and she must have thought he was worth it.

The knock on the door startled him.  He opened it to find Jack, dressed in jeans, sweatshirt and leather jacket, jangling car keys in his hand and looking at him expectantly. “You’re late,” he said. It wasn’t an accusation, merely a statement of fact.

“Sorry. I lost track of time,” Daniel said, vacillating between inviting Jack in and sending him away using the headache excuse.

“S’okay. Normally, Teal’c would give you the eyebrow all night, but I’m thinking he’s happy to cut you some slack for the next, oh, fifty years or so.”

They were all cutting him some slack, all the time. The least he could do was spend some time with them. Show willing.

“Come in. If you can give me five minutes ...” He left the door open and crossed to the chest of drawers for a fresh shirt and the closet for a pair of pants.

“Hey. We got all the time in the world, right? I mean, it’s not like you’re going to go all glowy on us again any time soon.” The way Jack said it made it sound more like a plea for reassurance than a question.

Daniel paused and caught a glimpse of Jack in the big mirror over the drawers. He looked tired and a little anxious. For the first time, Daniel was aware of the toll his absence had taken on his friend. Daniel had no idea whether he’d missed his team while he was away, but his team had made it clear to him that he was missed. Desperately, heartbreakingly missed.

“I don’t have any plans to,” he said, softly. But who knew? If his life was anything like the pile of folders on the desk suggested, anything could happen.

 “Good because that whole giant white squid thing is getting old.”

Daniel smiled. He was learning to speak Jack again, the hardest language of any he had ever learned, he suspected.  He sat on the bed and unlaced his boots, pulled off his BDU pants and reached for his black chinos; Sam and Janet went shopping for essentials for him upon his return after sheepishly admitting that most of his stuff had gone to charitable causes. Except for the stuff that Jack had kept alive. Personal stuff.

Jack wandered over to the desk and tapped his fingers on the pile of mission reports. “A little light reading?” he asked, opening the folder on top.

“Not so light. There are so many. I can’t believe half of what we’ve done.”

Jack peered at the photograph of Daniel attached to the papers in the file. “I can’t believe your hair.”

Daniel laughed, then, and the sound of it surprised him. It was deeper than he would have guessed. He swallowed hard and felt momentarily panicked.  The sound of his own laughter was alien to him.

Jack’s hand on his arm was another surprise.  “You okay?” he said, his voice low and laced with concern.

Daniel looked down at his arm, then up into worried eyes. “Yes,” he said, frowning, inexplicably comforted by the weight and feel of Jack’s hand. “Things ... take me by surprise sometimes, that’s all. I’m not really comfortable with ... me, yet. I guess.”

“It’s gonna take time, Daniel. Fraiser says ...”

“That I have to let it happen naturally, I know. The theory is great. The reality I’m finding more difficult.”

Jack didn’t seem to be in a hurry to move his hand, and Daniel was glad to let him leave it there. After a few seconds, Jack squeezed his arm, seemed to realize what he was doing and pulled away. “You hungry?” He picked up the stone statue and inspected it, turning it this way and that. Turning a frown upside down.

“Not really.”

“Well, pretend you are. Carter and Teal’c are cooking up a collective storm at her place. It’s sure to be a culinary delight.”

Daniel could tell by the undisguised sarcasm it was unlikely to be the case. He started to button his shirt. “I’ll just be happy to get off the base.”

Jack put the statue back in its place. “Yeah, I can see how you might be going a little stir crazy in here.”

“You have no idea,” Daniel said, wrangling his collar into place. He missed his robes. They were practical and easy, and not chosen by someone else.

“So tell me,” Jack said, plunking down beside him on the bed.

Daniel eyed him suspiciously. “I thought you said we were late.”

“We are. Few more minutes won’t make much difference. If the main course spoils, we can skip straight to dessert, which might be a blessing. Even Carter can’t ruin ice cream.”

Daniel huffed a laugh. The joke was on Sam but it felt like a joke born out of shared experience and friendship. Jack was including him because he belonged.

“Okay. But you won’t like it.”

“Try me,” Jack said, slapping his hands on his knees and looking attentive.

“I miss the planet where you found me,” Daniel said, assuming honesty was the best policy.

Jack pursed his lips. “You’re right. I don’t like it.”

Daniel sighed but plowed on. “I miss the ease of Shamda’s company, the measured pace of life, and the wide-open space. God ... Jack, the air was so clear and it was so quiet. You could walk for miles and hear nothing but the wind in the trees and the rush of water over rocks.”

“Folksy,” Jack said, smiling the kind of vaguely condescending smile that Daniel was learning to find irritating.

“Well, you did ask,” Daniel said, not bothering to hide his irritation and knowing in an elemental part of him it didn’t matter. He worried the top button on the blue cotton shirt. To do it up or leave undone? He looked back at Jack to find him looking at him. Just ... looking.  As soon as their gaze met, Jack turned his face away, just as he had done the half dozen or so times Daniel had caught him watching before. Daniel would have chalked it up to concern, but there was something else at play. He just wasn’t sure what it was.

“It’s just,” Daniel started, trying again to explain, “the freedom I found there was wonderful. I was free to be Arrom.”

“You’re _Daniel,”_ Jack said, forcefully, turning a quarter turn towards him. His knee brushed Daniel’s thigh, sending a jolt through Daniel’s body. Daniel looked down to where their bodies touched. The feeling of connection was shocking. More real than anything he’d felt since his return.

“Yeah? Well, I don’t feel that. I don’t _know_ Daniel. I don’t know this person. And I’m getting mixed signals.  The guy in the files is not the man you and Sam and Teal’c tell me he is.”

“Reports do not and cannot tell the whole story.” Jack said, voice even, eyes fierce. “He’s a good guy.”

“But I don’t _know_ him, Jack.”

“Well, I do, Daniel!”  This time when their eyes met, Jack didn’t avert his gaze.

Daniel held his hands out in a “go ahead, be my guest” gesture.

Jack took a breath and steeled himself. “You like your coffee black at work and with cream on weekends, you like staying up late because that way you don’t have do early. You have a penchant for scaring the shit out of your team. You don’t suffer fools gladly or at all, and frighten other COs to fucking death because they don’t understand you, and you think all sports should be banned from TV with the possible exception of naked jello wrestling, or so you once said on an alcohol-fueled  night out with me and Teal’c. You get drunk on two beers but can drink any of us under the table when it comes to wine. You love peanuts but not peanut butter, think broccoli is the work of the devil and you can’t carry a tune in a bucket. You’re good at chess when you can be bothered to concentrate, ie, you’re not thinking about work while playing, and ...”

Daniel waited. Jack’s mouth opened and closed.

“And?”

Jack sighed. Now, he did look away. “And ... we should get going. There’s late and then there’s rude.” Jack stood up. The conversation was clearly over.  He shoved his hands in his pockets and made for the door.

Daniel, still seated on the bed and unconsciously gripping the bedcover in white-knuckled fists, was left reeling from Jack’s info dump. It was too weird that someone else knew you better than you did yourself. And Jack _did_ know him.“ Wow,” he said, stunned into a one-word response, then recovered enough to add, “Daniel Jackson 101.”

“Jackson For Dummies, look, can we please go?”

“You’re no dummy and it’s a mystery to me why you appear to like letting people think you are. Did I ever figure that out before? And what else do you know about me that I don’t know?”

It was Jack’s turn to look annoyed. “A million and one things, Daniel, all of which you will remember eventually.”

“No. There’s something else. There’s something in that million and one things that you’re not telling me. The And.”

“There’s always an And, Daniel. Or an Or.”

“Do these conversations always end up like this?”

“Pretty much.”

“Then how the hell did we remain friends?”

The quick riposte that Daniel expected didn’t come. There had been a flicker of something in Jack’s eyes when Daniel flung the question at him. It could have been one of any number of things but Daniel instantly parsed it as pain. Christ. This relationship with Jack was a minefield; dangerously difficult to navigate.

“Look, when I said earlier that I remember enough I wasn’t lying. I remember, I have a _sense,_ that we were friends. But I don’t know the history behind us. I don’t remember how we came to be the kind of friends who can be this way.”

Jack had turned away from Daniel and paused with his hand on the door handle. “Isn’t it enough that you remember enough? For now?” There was an unexpectedly painful note of pleading in Jack’s tone.

Daniel closed his eyes. A headache was brewing. A real one. No pretense needed. He could cry off the night out and it would be legitimate. Instead, he crossed to the closet and pulled out a leather jacket that was slightly too big for him. It had been one of the things Jack had kept for him. He  pulled at the over-long sleeves in irritation. “Have I shrunk since I came back?”

“Actually, it’s mine. You commandeered it when you came back from Abydos the night you stayed at my house.”

Daniel pulled the jacket closely around him. “And you didn’t take it back?” It felt comfortable and warm. Safe. It was the perfect fit, even though it was a size too big.

“No,” Jack said, quietly. “I didn’t.”

Daniel mentally pictured the minefield. He saw himself treading softly, taking small steps, edging round the concealed explosives waiting to take him out.

“And you love every contradictory, annoying thing that makes me ... me.”

Jack got it. No explanation required. Daniel saw it in the affectionate crinkle of his eyes and the slight, relieved upturn of his mouth.

The And.

Jack turned back to the door and opened it.

“Wait for me,” Daniel said, on an impulse _. I’ll get there. It’s coming back. I’m coming back._

“The theory’s great. The reality,” Jack’s voice broke a little and he coughed to hide his discomfort, “I’m finding more difficult.”

Daniel’s heart pounded. There _was_ more at play here and he was certain he’d find out what it was if he could manage to navigate through the mines. “But there’s the And,” he said.

“There’s the And,” Jack said.

They smiled at each other then, tentative but real smiles that eased a pain in Daniel’s heart he hadn’t realized was there.

Into the silence that filled the space between them, Jack’s stomach growled, long and loud. Daniel laughed. As tension-breakers went, it was, Daniel was sure, pure Jack.

“Think dinner’s ruined?” Daniel asked, scooping up keys and wallet from the drawers.

“We never get that lucky,” Jack said and headed into the corridor.

Daniel switched off the desk lamp and closed the door behind them.

 

ends


End file.
